Julie Bierach

City Voters Overwhelmingly Agree to Keep Earnings Tax

Now that voters in both of Missouri's large cities have renewed their earnings taxes, leaders of both St. Louis and Kansas City say now is the time for a hard look at how they operate. Kansas City voted Tuesday to keep its 1 percent earnings tax by a 3-to-1 margin. The gap was bigger in St. Louis, where nearly 90 percent of voters favored the 1 percent tax.

Election Day in St. Louis

It's election day in Missouri and voters in St. Louis and Kansas City will head to the polls to decide whether to retain each community's 1 percent earnings tax. In St. Louis, the $140 million from the tax is about a third of the city's revenue. If the proposition fails, the tax will be phased out over the next ten years. 

Officials with the Missouri and Illinois Departments of Transportation are joining efforts to highlight Work Zone Safety Week, which begins today and runs through Friday.

With the start of spring in St. Louis, crews will be increasing construction efforts, patching potholes and resurfacing roads.

Ed Hassinger is district engineer with MoDOT. He says last year in St. Louis there were 2,500 accidents in work zones and eight people died.

Missouri Senate Committee to Release Redistricting Map Today

A Missouri Senate committee is preparing to consider a plan for developing new congressional districts. Missouri is losing one of its nine seats in the U.S. House, and the state Legislature is responsible for drawing the boundaries of the eight resulting districts. The Senate committee on redistricting is scheduled to release its proposed map today.

Martin Family Files Suit Against August Busch IV

A wrongful-death lawsuit filed against former Anheuser-Busch CEO August Busch IV over the drug overdose death of his girlfriend has set off a squabble within her family. The lawsuit filed Thursday accuses Busch of carelessness and negligence in the December death of 27-year-old Adrienne Martin at Busch's estate. It seeks unspecified damages for her 8-year-old son.

An autopsy identified an accidental oxycodone overdose as Martin's cause of death, though it showed she also had cocaine in her system.